Monday, February 26, 2007

We received a little snow over the weekend. I think I heard that it actually was the third or fourth largest amount of snow that has fallen here since the Great Halloween Snowstorm of '91. I think we got about a foot of snow at my house; the offical readings are 6" to 18" around the city and up to 3 ft in the southern part of the state. It looks so nice and pretty on the ground.

When it snows like this, most cities declare a "Snow Emergency" (note capitalization) It is up to each city to decide what consititues a Snow Emergency, what rules they want to enforce and when to call it.

For my Southern readers, I thought you might be entertained by the choreographed parking dance that will now take place in my city for the next three days due to the Snow Emergency. Of course, this could get more complicated as we are expecting another storm this coming weekend. Here are the directions:

Day 1 - 9 p.m. (Sun, Feb 25) to 8 a.m. (Mon, Feb 26) (overnight)A Snow Emergency will be declared no later than 6 p.m. on any given day. At 9 p.m. on that day, Snow Emergency parking rules begin.Park on either side of non-Snow Emergency routes (these streets DO NOT have the red sign: Snow Emergency Route).Do not park on either side of the street with the red sign: Snow Emergency Route. Snow plows will clear those streets first.After a street is fully plowed to the curb, feel free to park there, even if Snow Emergency parking rules are still in effect. Fully plowed means the street is completely cleared and plowed to the curb. Plows may come through more than once, so make sure that it is fully plowed to the curb before parking.

Day 2 - 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (Mon, Feb 26)At 8 a.m., Day Two parking rules begin. Park on the odd side of non-Snow Emergency Route streets (example: house address number 1359 Maple or 2513 17th Ave.). Park on either side of streets with the red sign: Snow Emergency Route.Do not park on the EVEN side of non-Snow Emergency routes. (Example: house address number: 1356 Maple or 2512 17th Ave.)Do not park on either side of parkways.After a street is fully plowed to the curb, feel free to park there, even if Snow Emergency parking rules are still in effect. Fully plowed means the street is completely cleared and plowed to the curb. Plows may come through more than once, so make sure that it is fully plowed to the curb before parking.

Day 3 - 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (Tue, Feb 27)At 8 a.m., Day Three parking rules begin.Park on even side of non-Snow Emergency Route streets. (Example: house address number: 1356 Maple or 2512 17th Ave.)Park on either side of streets marked with the red sign: Snow Emergency Route and you may park on parkways.Do not park on the ODD side of non-Snow Emergency Route streets (example: house address number 1359 or 2513 17th Ave.).After a street is fully plowed to the curb, feel free to park there, even if Snow Emergency parking rules are still in effect. Fully plowed means the street is completely cleared and plowed to the curb. Plows may come through more than once, so make sure that it is fully plowed to the curb before parking.

Got that? I hope so. Because if you screw up, you will be ticketed ($34). You will probably also be towed ($138 + $18/day storage charge. If you have a big vehicle it will be $175 + $45 per half hour for the towing + $18/day storage). If you don't get towed, by the time the plows pass by you will wish you had been towed. Shoveling that plowed, compacted snow is heart attack inducing.

I notice now that the impound lot (which by the way is located on the parcel of land that is most inconvenient to everyone in the city), now takes credit cards. The year my car was towed they only took cash, which made for a pleasant afternoon of riding the city bus to the bank and then to the impound lot.

Tonight on the news (I would bet money on this) there will be a news camera & a newbie reporter down at the impound lot interviewing pissed off car owners waiting in an endless line with a wad of money to pick up their cars.

4 comments:

It’s like we live on a different planet 3 months out of the year. I can NOT EVEN imagine what that is like, but oddly enough I’ve often thought about living in the north. I came very close to moving to Vermont when I ended up in Eureka. The winters were a big issue for me only because I just wouldn’t know how to deal with it.

We got a 5.4 earthquake at about 4:15 AM this morning. I woke up when it felt like a car hit the house and then laid there and felt the shaking for the next 5 or 6 seconds and then immediately fell back to sleep. Earthquakes I know how to deal with.

I hope you're well provisioned too, Stucco. We had mostly ice here, and were fortunate, we didn't lose power over the weekend, but many others did.

I'll try to do a blog post on this, but a house 2 blocks from us had a 22 foot DIAMETER tree (newspaper reports) (having been there I'd say they are close to accurate) That went down into the NEIGHBOR'S house! This thing was a maple with 5 separate trees all growing out of the trunk area. It took out their chimney and a good chunk of roof.

I just read your comment on Greg's site. I was an ebay virgin until Nov 2005 when I broke a favorite discontinued bowl that I used EVERY DAY for a month while making approx 10,000 Christmas cookies. For the heck of it, I decided to try ebay and bid on a bowl and didn't win it. Bid on another and didn't win. Said to self, I'll get them.... and bid on 7 of them. Fortunately I didn't win two of them and only had 4 extra ones to get rid of.

Greg - So true. Every now and then an airplane with fly low over my house while taking off and my house will slightly rumble - this can wake me up out of a deep sleep. I can't even imagine an earthquake. You learn to deal with snow pretty fast around here.

Mike - I'm one of those people that could probably survive for a year snowed into my house. I do a lot of canning. I'm lucky that my heat is gas. We had one day of falling sleet before the hard snow, but I didn't hear of any electricity down...in the cities at least. 22 ft - Holy Cow! I have a hundred yr old oak in my backyard with a very big dead branch. It's scarily close to my bedroom and I have laid awake nights worrying about this during past storms.....but if we could somehow get to take out the rotted soffits & fascia on that side.....

Kathy - Very cool that you were able to replace the bowl. Every now and again when I am bored I will take a look at ebay. I can just tell from the way my heart races when I see some of the old house stuff, that I had best just let well enough alone. I can do enough damage in my local old house spots :-)